NAACP calls for oil spill claims reform

View full sizeThe NAACP is calling for improvements to the oil spill claims process.

MOBILE, Ala. -- The Gulf Coast Claims Facility must quickly improve the claims process, BP should pay for physical and mental health care centers, and the Food and Drug Administration needs to evaluate seafood more thoroughly, according to a new report by the NAACP.

A team interviewed dozens of people along the Gulf Coast — including Coden and Orange Beach — to hear first-hand accounts of spill impacts.

One goal of the work was to bring more awareness to issues facing spill victims, according to Jacqueline Patterson, climate justice director for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.

Among the report’s findings were adverse health effects in the Gulf region. Patterson described substantial increases in depression, domestic violence and substance abuse among those she interviewed.

“Thousands of Gulf residents not only have not been ‘made whole,’” according to the report, “but many have faced elevated levels of toxins in their blood, community conflicts, destruction of families, culture erosion, loss of property ... and an end to their way of life for the foreseeable future.”

Nancy McCall, a 66-year-old Coden woman, talked to Patterson for the report.

“It is very sad, and it breaks your heart to know the water is not healed yet,” McCall said. “It’s real scary. Will it go up the food chain? It’s not over. It’s not over at all.”